Stolen funds could pay for rebuilding

Ex-governors' allegedly embezzled funds total 259 billion pesos

Mexico News Daily | Tuesday, September 26, 2017

Money stolen by former state governors could easily cover the costs of rebuilding after this month’s earthquakes, an analysis reveals.

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The funds allegedly embezzled by 22 ex-governors who have been accused of corruption add up to 259 billion pesos (US $14.5 billion at the current exchange rate), according to the newspaper El Universal.

That’s 29 times the balance of the federal disaster relief fund, Fonden, and more than enough to rebuild infrastructure damaged or destroyed during the September 7 and 19 earthquakes.

The funds allegedly stolen by seven ex-governors on the list represent nearly half the total.

• Javier Duarte Ochoa, who governed Veracruz between 2010 and 2016, allegedly stole 35 billion pesos during that period. (The ASF has said the figure could be as high as 60 billion.)

• One Duarte is followed by another: César Duarte Jáquez, governor of Chihuahua from 2010 to 2016, has been accused of stealing 80 billion pesos.

• Nayarit’s Roberto Sandoval Castañeda, whose term as governor ended last week, is facing a legal complaint for illicit enrichment and mismanagement of at least 1.5 billion pesos.

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• Rodrigo Medina de la Cruz, governor of Nuevo León for the from 2009-2015 term, has been accused of embezzlement and pecuniary damage to the state coffers in the amount of 3.6 billion pesos.

• The alleged corruption of former Quintana Roo governor Roberto Borge Angulo, currently awaiting extradition from Panama, is said to have cost the state treasury 1.9 billion pesos during his term, between 2011 and 2016.

• In Colima, the state auditor’s office has said that former governor Mario Anguiano Moreno diverted over 2.1 billion pesos of state funds during the six years of his administration, between 2009 and 2015.

• Yucatán’s Rodrigo Zapata Bello, the only governor currently in office on El Universal‘s black list, has been singled out by the state auditor’s office for an alleged misuse of resources that amounts to 30.1 million pesos. Zapata took office in 2012, and his term ends next year.

All seven governors took office under the banner of the governing Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI).

On the other hand, some governors currently in office have pledged to give rather than take by helping with earthquake relief and reconstruction efforts.

Francisco Domínguez Servién of Querétaro has pledged to donate his year-end bonus, about 250,000 pesos, while Jaime Rodríguez Calderón of Nuevo León pledged almost one month’s salary, which amounts to just over 105,000 pesos.